The Golden Filter: Talk Talk Talk

Is this my blog theme song? I never heard it before today.  :-)

Talk Talk Talk -- YouTube

Enjoy!

Mueller Punted

I can imagine the Special Investigator not wanting to become Special Prosecutor and deciding whether to prosecute. But, turning over that decision to a clearly partisan AG, William Barr, is to say "No prosecution". You can't say he didn't decide. You can't "punt" in this kind of matter.

Green Energy

Plastic waste has been a problem for some time and creating cheap clean energy from wind or solar rays is also important. Now there's a way to get some energy from old waste plastic!

Changing waste plastic into a liquid fuel - Global Citizen

Global economy would save up to $160 trillion by shifting to renewables, electric cars – ThinkProgress

Renewable Friday: Getting to 100%

Attorney General and Mueller Report

Watching our mild-mannered Attorney General and hearing his words I can only come to the conclusion that he has passed the Mueller report to Donald Trump's lawyers and they are worried about certain parts of it. The reason I say this is that the AG also said he intends to investigate whether the Trump campaign was spied on in 2016. Usually DJT's technique is to talk down anybody he considers a danger and whom he cannot directly fire, sue, or otherwise harm. So, he intends to talk down the FBI and (in his own way) show they should have never investigated him and his campaign in the first place. By talking down the FBI he can come close to dismissing the Mueller report findings.

I suspect the report shows there was spying by Russia on both campaigns, but that the campaign assisted Russian efforts and the Russians assisted campaign efforts (as we have heard via Facebook) and that all the spying done on the Clinton campaign or the Democratic Party was to gather information which ended helping Trump.

Our AG is a disgusting slime who is apparently a small toad in the hands of Donald Trump. It seems clear he is more than a political pawn, he is the tool of individual_one.

Ray Dalio speaks on 60 Minutes

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/why-how-capitalism-needs-reformed-parts-1-2-ray-dalio/

I could bitch and moan that he's 20-30 years late to these realizations, but it's more useful to praise the work he has done to quantify the situation. His graphs and stats paint a sad picture.

I think Democrats have been worried about issues of the day, but there has also been interest in improving education. It was the big issue of the late 1980s and 1990s. Patent reform was on Pres. Obama's agenda. Banking reform was done in the early 2010s to reverse a lot of the deregulation which bankers had (effectively) bought from Congress over the preceding 50 years. Democrats have been trying to get a minimum wage for a long time. It isn't happening. So, the issues are not unknown and it isn't as if there is nobody paying attention to these problems.

Dalio will hopefully connect with Republicans and business leaders. It's a step in the right direction. Hopefully specific policies will follow.

McConnell Speech Today Advise and Consent

Studying the history of the senate to find a rationale for actions today is somewhat typical of Conservatives. The Democrats are more concerned with today and tomorrows. For that we must have a way to get nominations studied and rejected or confirmed, but without idiotic candidates such as Trump has made being rammed through on party lines. The idea of 51 votes confirming most nominations is not so objectionable as that Trump should get to make any nominations whatsoever. That he should get to put a single Justice on the Supreme Court is disgusting. Yes, there was an election. But don't forget it wasn't the popular vote that put George W. Bush or Donald J Trump in the presidency and don't forget that there was Russian involvement in the 2016 election. To ignore all this is to make plain that it's only a cherry-picked Senate history which McConnell wants to review.

I thought it was amusing when he said each of the Democratic senators had teeth. I think he said they weren't toothless. But, implied was that it irritated him when they actually used those teeth to bite.

Tough. Deal with it.

Brexit

If the House members are voting against the many different options are wanting THEIR ideas accepted, then it is clear by now that there isn't any easy majority for them. If they're worried that voting FOR something might cause them to lose votes in the next election, then nothing could ever be achieved because the Brexit idea cuts across all parties. In the case of people not getting their own ideas, there are two options awaiting them: hard Brexit or revocation of Article 50 (so they can remain in the EU). Waiting for that choice is a huge gamble for either side. In the latter case of voter worries, they will never work out a good deal and it would have to be returned to the public to vote for another solution. But, if they vote again it would ruin the idea that the first vote was meaningful. No, that won't happen. Again, it leads to the two radical possibilities: a hard Brexit or revocation of Aritcle 50.

So, each side, meaning both Tories and Labour and Brexit Leavers and Remainers, have to look at this hard choice and wonder who is able to make that one 'vote'. Isn't it PM May? Do they trust they will get what they want based on things she has said. She seems dedicated to Leaving as the referendum outcome indicated, so it seems obvious that will be the choice. Are the Remainers really satisfied with that? So far they haven't shown any ability to avoid it. It seems clear that Leave it will be and a HARD Brexit at that. Welcome to the WTO.

ETF Tax Dodge

Bloomberg reports on "The ETF Tax Dodge". It's an interesting story which has its roots in the Nixon years.

https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2019-etf-tax-dodge-lets-investors-save-big/

"That loophole gives ETFs a tax advantage over mutual funds. It went from a footnote in the tax code to the cornerstone of a new industry.

For some of the earliest ETFs, which followed broad indexes such as the S&P 500 and rarely changed holdings, the daily process of brokers creating and redeeming was enough to wash away almost all capital gains. The first and largest ETF, State Street's SPDR S&P 500 ETF, hasn't reported a taxable gain in 22 years. In contrast, a traditional mutual fund run by Fidelity Investments that tracks the same index had a taxable gain in 10 of those years."

"The Internal Revenue Service says it's aware of heartbeats and wouldn't say whether it considers them an abuse."

One example Bloomberg cites ends with, "Thanks to winnings on stocks like that, the fund reported more than $4 billion in capital gains for the year. But since it used the ETF tax loophole to shield those gains from taxes, its annual report shows, it ended up reporting a $309 million capital loss to the IRS."

Somehow it sounds like the taxpaying citizen is paying the full bill while these investment funds are walking away scott free.